Revista Geográfica Venezolana
ISSN: 1012-1617
[email protected]
Universidad de los Andes
Venezuela
Fortunato, Iván
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad
Revista Geográfica Venezolana, vol. 57, núm. 1, enero-junio, 2016, pp. 130-137
Universidad de los Andes
Mérida, Venezuela
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Proyecto académico sin fines de lucro, desarrollado bajo la iniciativa de acceso abierto
pp. 130—137
Recibido: julio, 2015
Aceptado: octubre, 2015
130
Iván Fortunato
Notas sobre
el lugar
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad. pp. 130—137
Resumen
Este artículo es un ensayo sobre el concepto de lugar a través del lente de la
geogracidad. Sobre la base de Dardel, Relph y Tuan, tenemos la intención de
demostrar que los lugares de nuestra vida hacen mucho más que apoyar a nuestros comportamientos, deseos, sentimientos y expectativas, ya que, al igual que
nuestros amigos, compañeros, colegas y familiares, un lugar nos puede cambiar
y dar calidad de vida, conectándose con nuestra propia existencia. Dos lugares
especícos de la propia experiencia del autor se presentan como ejemplos de
desde el punto de vista
de la geograficidad
cómo los lugares se mezclan con nuestras experiencias. Al nal, este ensayo se ha
escrito para apoyar la hipótesis de que todo el mundo puede encontrar sus lugares
signicativos.
Palabras clave: lugar; Dardel; Geografía Humanística.
Abstract
This paper is an essay regarding the concept of place through the lens of
geographicity. Based on Dardel, Relph and Tuan, we intend to demonstrate
Notes about place from
a geographicity standpoint
that the places of our lives do much more than just support our behaviors,
desires, feelings and expectations because, just lie our friends, companions,
colleagues and family, a place involves personal change and it offers quality to
life, connecting itself to the core of our own existence. Two specic places of the
author’s very own experience are presented as examples of how places do blend
with our experiences. At the end, this paper was written to support the hypothesis
that everyone can meet their meaningful places.
key words: place; Dardel; humanistic geography.
Iván Fortunato
Instituto Federal de Educação,
Ciência e Tecnologia de São Paulo (IFSP),
Campus de Itapetininga. São Paulo (SP), Brasil
[email protected]
INICIO
SUMARIO
131
pp. 130—137
Recibido: julio, 2015
Aceptado: octubre, 2015
130
Iván Fortunato
Notas sobre
el lugar
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad. pp. 130—137
Resumen
Este artículo es un ensayo sobre el concepto de lugar a través del lente de la
geogracidad. Sobre la base de Dardel, Relph y Tuan, tenemos la intención de
demostrar que los lugares de nuestra vida hacen mucho más que apoyar a nuestros comportamientos, deseos, sentimientos y expectativas, ya que, al igual que
nuestros amigos, compañeros, colegas y familiares, un lugar nos puede cambiar
y dar calidad de vida, conectándose con nuestra propia existencia. Dos lugares
especícos de la propia experiencia del autor se presentan como ejemplos de
desde el punto de vista
de la geograficidad
cómo los lugares se mezclan con nuestras experiencias. Al nal, este ensayo se ha
escrito para apoyar la hipótesis de que todo el mundo puede encontrar sus lugares
signicativos.
Palabras clave: lugar; Dardel; Geografía Humanística.
Abstract
Notes about place from
a geographicity standpoint
This paper is an essay regarding the concept of place through the lens of
geographicity. Based on Dardel, Relph and Tuan, we intend to demonstrate
that the places of our lives do much more than just support our behaviors,
desires, feelings and expectations because, just lie our friends, companions,
colleagues and family, a place involves personal change and it offers quality to
life, connecting itself to the core of our own existence. Two specic places of the
author’s very own experience are presented as examples of how places do blend
with our experiences. At the end, this paper was written to support the hypothesis
that everyone can meet their meaningful places.
key words: place; Dardel; humanistic geography.
Iván Fortunato
Instituto Federal de Educação,
Ciência e Tecnologia de São Paulo (IFSP),
Campus de Itapetininga. São Paulo (SP), Brasil
[email protected]
131
132
Iván Fortunato
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad. pp. 130—137
Notes about place from
a geographicity standpoint 1
a geographicity viewpoint is to recognize that a place greatly matters in
the quality of everyday experience, because a place is not only where we
live, but it is part of our life; it is not just a geometric area with dened
boundaries, but also unique in its own name and characteristics. This
means that we can all name and fully describe at least one country or city
or street, store, club, par, a room we are fond of… or a place we just as
well dislie or even fear.
For me, geographicity was empirically revealing itself, as I could
observe and understand the importance of places in the quality of my
own earthly experience. Actually, I have started to better grasp this when
I moved to the big city of Sao Paulo and I was welcomed into a very distinguished district named Mooca. It was lie one could almost touch its
warmness and that was a feeling that just had to be shared. Not far from
Mooca, another emotional bond was established with São Paulo’s Historic
Center. Its history and collective sense of homeness, wor and daily life
experienced in this place had to be jotted down so people could reect
upon this place and perhaps go beyond its obviousness: it is not just an old
district full of homeless people and popular commerce. So I made sure to
highlight the meanings of those experiences in which the sense of place
became alive, recording them through papers published in Brazilian journals (Fortunato, 2012; 2014; 2015; Fortunato et al., 2011).
As follows, these experiences show that a place is much more than a
simple scenario of events. From the phenomenological perspective, Relph
(1976a) conrmed this idea by refusing the Man-Earth duality, taing a
place further than its spatial location, considering it as part of the experience and extension of the individual, becoming a source for safety and
belonging. For this author, the recognition of a place is idiosyncratic and
it is related to a particular and metaphorical reading of the environment
where the meanings are assigned symbolically and emotionally, often without the need for any concrete ballast in the physical environment to justify the affection and assigned values. Ergo, a place is built by experience,
establishing a sense of complicity and mutual responsibilities of care and
protection. Place is involvement and acceptance, being recognized by the
feeling of being at home ... As Relph (1976b: 141) have stated: “Places are
fusions of human and natural order and are the signicant centres of our
immediate experiences of the world. They are dened less by unique locations, landscape, and communities than by the focusing of experiences and
intentions onto particular settings. Places are not abstractions or concepts,
but are directly experienced phenomena of the lived-world and hence are full
with meanings, with real objects, and with ongoing activities. They are important sources of individual and communal identity, and are often profound
In the small world of each person places are more than
simple entities that provide the physical environment
where the drama of life happens. Some places are
symbols for lived experiences, centers loaded with
meanings. And as such, places are attached to the core
of human existence2 (Godin, 1985: 242).
It is more than common to hear someone stating that when it comes to sharing an experience what really matter are the people that come along, regardless of where one is. The fact is that most individuals who claim this
are planning ‘where’ to go during the Holydays or selecting the ‘location’
of his/her wedding or birthday party, the ‘whereabouts’ of the new apartment… We do agree: people with whom we share our journey on Earth
do mae our existence richer. Nevertheless, the place where we mae it
happen has an equal fundamental role when it comes to appraising our
experience and how we feel. What we intend to demonstrate throughout
this paper is that the places of our lives do much more than just support
our behaviors, desires, feelings and expectations because, just lie our
friends, companions, colleagues and family, a place undergoes change and
it gives quality to life, connecting itself, just lie Godin (1985: 242) stated
above, to the core of human existence”.
Thus, we infer that people relate to places in a way that is very similar
to the relationship one have with others. Maybe it was Dardel3 (2011), in
the early 1950s, the rst to alert us about this complicity we have with
places on Earth. From the perspective of geographicity, a eld that studies the sense of the experiences with places and the human perception
about the place one inhabits, this author sought to understand the disgust,
aversion and/or fear we have for a whole city or for a simple street, but he
also sought for the close ties that bind us to a neighborhood or a square,
for instance.
Dardel (2011: 33) started off from the idea about the geographical reality, stating that this should not be considered as a simple object, wherein
the “geographical science assumes that the world is geographically known,
that humans feel and know they are bond to the Earth and are being called
to be held in their earthly condition”. Geographicity refers, therefore, to
this lin with the planet and that it is understood as something concrete,
while sharpened by a strong emotional feeling. This is why to thin from
INICIO
SUMARIO
133
132
Iván Fortunato
Notes about place from
a geographicity standpoint 1
In the small world of each person places are more than
simple entities that provide the physical environment
where the drama of life happens. Some places are
symbols for lived experiences, centers loaded with
meanings. And as such, places are attached to the core
of human existence2 (Godin, 1985: 242).
It is more than common to hear someone stating that when it comes to sharing an experience what really matter are the people that come along, regardless of where one is. The fact is that most individuals who claim this
are planning ‘where’ to go during the Holydays or selecting the ‘location’
of his/her wedding or birthday party, the ‘whereabouts’ of the new apartment… We do agree: people with whom we share our journey on Earth
do mae our existence richer. Nevertheless, the place where we mae it
happen has an equal fundamental role when it comes to appraising our
experience and how we feel. What we intend to demonstrate throughout
this paper is that the places of our lives do much more than just support
our behaviors, desires, feelings and expectations because, just lie our
friends, companions, colleagues and family, a place undergoes change and
it gives quality to life, connecting itself, just lie Godin (1985: 242) stated
above, to the core of human existence”.
Thus, we infer that people relate to places in a way that is very similar
to the relationship one have with others. Maybe it was Dardel3 (2011), in
the early 1950s, the rst to alert us about this complicity we have with
places on Earth. From the perspective of geographicity, a eld that studies the sense of the experiences with places and the human perception
about the place one inhabits, this author sought to understand the disgust,
aversion and/or fear we have for a whole city or for a simple street, but he
also sought for the close ties that bind us to a neighborhood or a square,
for instance.
Dardel (2011: 33) started off from the idea about the geographical reality, stating that this should not be considered as a simple object, wherein
the “geographical science assumes that the world is geographically known,
that humans feel and know they are bond to the Earth and are being called
to be held in their earthly condition”. Geographicity refers, therefore, to
this lin with the planet and that it is understood as something concrete,
while sharpened by a strong emotional feeling. This is why to thin from
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad. pp. 130—137
a geographicity viewpoint is to recognize that a place greatly matters in
the quality of everyday experience, because a place is not only where we
live, but it is part of our life; it is not just a geometric area with dened
boundaries, but also unique in its own name and characteristics. This
means that we can all name and fully describe at least one country or city
or street, store, club, par, a room we are fond of… or a place we just as
well dislie or even fear.
For me, geographicity was empirically revealing itself, as I could
observe and understand the importance of places in the quality of my
own earthly experience. Actually, I have started to better grasp this when
I moved to the big city of Sao Paulo and I was welcomed into a very distinguished district named Mooca. It was lie one could almost touch its
warmness and that was a feeling that just had to be shared. Not far from
Mooca, another emotional bond was established with São Paulo’s Historic
Center. Its history and collective sense of homeness, wor and daily life
experienced in this place had to be jotted down so people could reect
upon this place and perhaps go beyond its obviousness: it is not just an old
district full of homeless people and popular commerce. So I made sure to
highlight the meanings of those experiences in which the sense of place
became alive, recording them through papers published in Brazilian journals (Fortunato, 2012; 2014; 2015; Fortunato et al., 2011).
As follows, these experiences show that a place is much more than a
simple scenario of events. From the phenomenological perspective, Relph
(1976a) conrmed this idea by refusing the Man-Earth duality, taing a
place further than its spatial location, considering it as part of the experience and extension of the individual, becoming a source for safety and
belonging. For this author, the recognition of a place is idiosyncratic and
it is related to a particular and metaphorical reading of the environment
where the meanings are assigned symbolically and emotionally, often without the need for any concrete ballast in the physical environment to justify the affection and assigned values. Ergo, a place is built by experience,
establishing a sense of complicity and mutual responsibilities of care and
protection. Place is involvement and acceptance, being recognized by the
feeling of being at home ... As Relph (1976b: 141) have stated: “Places are
fusions of human and natural order and are the signicant centres of our
immediate experiences of the world. They are dened less by unique locations, landscape, and communities than by the focusing of experiences and
intentions onto particular settings. Places are not abstractions or concepts,
but are directly experienced phenomena of the lived-world and hence are full
with meanings, with real objects, and with ongoing activities. They are important sources of individual and communal identity, and are often profound
133
134
Iván Fortunato
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad. pp. 130—137
centres of human existence to which people have deep emotional and psychological ties. Indeed our relationships with places are just as necessary,
varied, and sometimes perhaps just as unpleasant, as our relationships with
other people.”
It is important to clarify that the sense of place does not always equate
to a nurturing or a romanticized description of the experience because,
as cores of meanings, some places may trigger disaffection and disgust.
We must also remember that one place may even awae in a single individual affection and repulsion; or it can be an extremely affective place that
becomes aversive due to the quality of a few experiences lived there, and
vice versa. This is why geographicity is founded on a phenomenological
basis, on which every experience must be considered unique, including
those developed in our favorite places where we feel quite safe.
In addition to remembering that interactions with the places are not
always pleasant, Relph (1976b: 82) expressed concern about the increase
in non-authentic attitudes toward places, wherein “an inauthentic attitude to place is essentially no sense of place, for it involves no awareness of
the deep and symbolic signicances of places and no appreciation of their
identities”. In the author’s view, such attitudes, developed without the
perception of symbols and meanings of place, imply a ind of generalized
alienation of the very meaning of life, because it obscures the sense of
place. From this nding emerged, then, the concept of ‘placelessness’, in
reference to meaningless places, bonding or authenticity. This concept is
not about fear or hatred of a place, but the indifference that can be understood as something lie ‘I now nothing about the place where I am
and, franly, I do not care’.
Thus, when considering the human need for places and our connections with their symbols, meanings and values, the idea of placelessness
becomes a blunt warning, after all, without places, regrets Relph, the
capacity and the variety of human experiences are left limited to mere
repetition, or even only to survival and a tedious and insipid life. Hence
Relph’s (1976b: 146) aphorism: “whether the world we live in has a placeless
geography or a geography of signicant places, the responsibility for it is
ours alone”. From my standpoint, this responsibility had to be both accepted and taen. In this matter, the safety felt at Mooca, my neighborhood in
São Paulo, had to be shared for I was actually witnessing its entire warm
embrace being taen away for its landscape was turning into just another
indistinct district with very tall buildings: many of its old factory edices
are being demolished, maing room for modern home and oce complexes. This progress is not only destroying the environment, but just as well
it is ‘devouring’ the collective memory of its inhabitants (Fortunato, 2012).
Another way of taing responsibility for a place is devoting time to
really understanding it, which means going bac its history, getting acquainted with its most respectful happenings and people, and describing
it in all of its excellence and even its aws… I did that with a very special
place, the cornerstone of Sao Paulo, located in its very Historic Center: a
place named ‘Pateo do Collegio’, which was fully scanned and also ‘wooed’
in my doctoral dissertation (Fortunato, 2014).
From a theoretical perspective that is especially similar to Dardel’s
geographicity, Tuan (1983) outlines a place as a center of meaning and a
specic location, which is valued individually and/or collectively. These
values, he claries, are built on experience, which comes to attitudes,
cognitive components such as memory and perception, and affective elements, lie emotion. According to the author: “Human places vary greatly
in size. An armchair by the reside is a place, but so is the nation-state.
Small places can be known through direct experience, including the intimate
senses of smell and touch. A large region such as the nation-state is beyond
most people‘s direct experience, but it can be transformed into place - a focus
of passionate loyalty -through symbolic means of art, education, and politics How a mere space becomes an intensely human place is a task for the
humanistic geographer; it appeals to such distinctively humanist interest as
the nature of experience, the quality of the emotional bond to physical objects, and the role of concepts and symbols in the creation of place identity.”
(Tuan, 1976: 269).
This extensive quote carries ey concepts and the fundamental basis
of a geographical thought that helps us understand what we do on Earth,
and the reasons that lead us to our personal behavior, which are only the
visible part of a long submerged process involving cognition, memory,
emotions and feelings. The above quotation also helps to clarify this internal process, demonstrating, from the examples given, that place is very
personal (even when shared), much more emotional than concrete, more
felt and experienced than observed and rationalized. So, a place may be
the favorite chair resting the body, as well as it can be a vast territory,
which is not nown in whole, but that it is loved and protected, such as the
nation-state. Nonetheless, a place can also be the childhood home, a square, a room ..., and the sense of place can be aroused by everyday experience and/or by memory, be it individual and/or collective.
In this manner, Tuan (1976) wanted to demonstrate that the symbolic
contents are as strong as the experience in creating the sense of place ...
Just as there are times when the experience can be indirectly lived by the
memory that recovers the places, as are the example of notorious historical monuments, or natural emotional moments to visit the old house whe-
INICIO
SUMARIO
135
134
centres of human existence to which people have deep emotional and psychological ties. Indeed our relationships with places are just as necessary,
varied, and sometimes perhaps just as unpleasant, as our relationships with
other people.”
It is important to clarify that the sense of place does not always equate
to a nurturing or a romanticized description of the experience because,
as cores of meanings, some places may trigger disaffection and disgust.
We must also remember that one place may even awae in a single individual affection and repulsion; or it can be an extremely affective place that
becomes aversive due to the quality of a few experiences lived there, and
vice versa. This is why geographicity is founded on a phenomenological
basis, on which every experience must be considered unique, including
those developed in our favorite places where we feel quite safe.
In addition to remembering that interactions with the places are not
always pleasant, Relph (1976b: 82) expressed concern about the increase
in non-authentic attitudes toward places, wherein “an inauthentic attitude to place is essentially no sense of place, for it involves no awareness of
the deep and symbolic signicances of places and no appreciation of their
identities”. In the author’s view, such attitudes, developed without the
perception of symbols and meanings of place, imply a ind of generalized
alienation of the very meaning of life, because it obscures the sense of
place. From this nding emerged, then, the concept of ‘placelessness’, in
reference to meaningless places, bonding or authenticity. This concept is
not about fear or hatred of a place, but the indifference that can be understood as something lie ‘I now nothing about the place where I am
and, franly, I do not care’.
Thus, when considering the human need for places and our connections with their symbols, meanings and values, the idea of placelessness
becomes a blunt warning, after all, without places, regrets Relph, the
capacity and the variety of human experiences are left limited to mere
repetition, or even only to survival and a tedious and insipid life. Hence
Relph’s (1976b: 146) aphorism: “whether the world we live in has a placeless
geography or a geography of signicant places, the responsibility for it is
ours alone”. From my standpoint, this responsibility had to be both accepted and taen. In this matter, the safety felt at Mooca, my neighborhood in
São Paulo, had to be shared for I was actually witnessing its entire warm
embrace being taen away for its landscape was turning into just another
indistinct district with very tall buildings: many of its old factory edices
are being demolished, maing room for modern home and oce complexes. This progress is not only destroying the environment, but just as well
it is ‘devouring’ the collective memory of its inhabitants (Fortunato, 2012).
Iván Fortunato
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad. pp. 130—137
Another way of taing responsibility for a place is devoting time to
really understanding it, which means going bac its history, getting acquainted with its most respectful happenings and people, and describing
it in all of its excellence and even its aws… I did that with a very special
place, the cornerstone of Sao Paulo, located in its very Historic Center: a
place named ‘Pateo do Collegio’, which was fully scanned and also ‘wooed’
in my doctoral dissertation (Fortunato, 2014).
From a theoretical perspective that is especially similar to Dardel’s
geographicity, Tuan (1983) outlines a place as a center of meaning and a
specic location, which is valued individually and/or collectively. These
values, he claries, are built on experience, which comes to attitudes,
cognitive components such as memory and perception, and affective elements, lie emotion. According to the author: “Human places vary greatly
in size. An armchair by the reside is a place, but so is the nation-state.
Small places can be known through direct experience, including the intimate
senses of smell and touch. A large region such as the nation-state is beyond
most people‘s direct experience, but it can be transformed into place - a focus
of passionate loyalty -through symbolic means of art, education, and politics How a mere space becomes an intensely human place is a task for the
humanistic geographer; it appeals to such distinctively humanist interest as
the nature of experience, the quality of the emotional bond to physical objects, and the role of concepts and symbols in the creation of place identity.”
(Tuan, 1976: 269).
This extensive quote carries ey concepts and the fundamental basis
of a geographical thought that helps us understand what we do on Earth,
and the reasons that lead us to our personal behavior, which are only the
visible part of a long submerged process involving cognition, memory,
emotions and feelings. The above quotation also helps to clarify this internal process, demonstrating, from the examples given, that place is very
personal (even when shared), much more emotional than concrete, more
felt and experienced than observed and rationalized. So, a place may be
the favorite chair resting the body, as well as it can be a vast territory,
which is not nown in whole, but that it is loved and protected, such as the
nation-state. Nonetheless, a place can also be the childhood home, a square, a room ..., and the sense of place can be aroused by everyday experience and/or by memory, be it individual and/or collective.
In this manner, Tuan (1976) wanted to demonstrate that the symbolic
contents are as strong as the experience in creating the sense of place ...
Just as there are times when the experience can be indirectly lived by the
memory that recovers the places, as are the example of notorious historical monuments, or natural emotional moments to visit the old house whe-
135
136
Iván Fortunato
137
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad. pp. 130—137
Notes
re was born and raised, for example, one’s paternal grandfather, allowing
the individual to better understand his or her own history and therefore
their very own self. Hence the author’s claim about the tas of a humanistic geographer being the research on emotion, symbols, and experience in
the sense of place. How do people experience delight of body and spirit within places? How do those feelings deeply connect us with a given place?
These were questions that prompted the development of what Tuan
(1976: 272) named as “distinctive humanistic approach”, which is precisely
to describe the quality of the emotion experienced in specic cases” or, better, in specic places. This author deals with the interpretation of complex
human experiences in their contradictions, ambiguities and inconsistencies. Experiences that lie, mainly, on what is symbolic about the places
of human life. The tas of the humanist geographer, explains Tuan (1976:
273), is to show “how the place is a concept and a shared feeling”, and its
contribution is to suggest ways in which a sense of place can be emphasized”.
From this point of view we can therefore strengthen the idea that the
relationship with places is very similar to the relationship with another
person, because nowing a place suggests nowing its history and its
specic features which give its identity. This becomes evident when Tuan
(1975: 152) states that “to know a place fully means both to understand it in
an abstract way and to know it as one person knows another”, ratifying the
idea that places are as important as people in the sense of our own existence.
Place ... meaning center... basis of the experience ... The sense of place
is built on the direct and/or symbolic experience, involving feelings of
well-being, joy, fear, disgust... meaning that it lies also on the updating
of the past by memory, whether individual or collective. Small places and
reserved, as the bedroom... huge places and unnown to the fullest, as
the country in which we live ... ephemeral and transient places ... Places ...
Place ... core of human existence.”
This is certainly inconclusive but, at our very best, we can properly
state that a place is not just there for it can be found there… And just lie
I have claimed ‘Mooca’ and ‘Pateo do Collegio’ as my places, I am quite
certain that everyone can meet their very own meaningful places.
1.
I acnowledge Guilherme Fortunato for reviewing and offering quality comments on the draft
paper.
2.
The original text is in Spanish: En el pequeño mundo de cada persona los lugares son algo más
que unas simples entidades que proporcionan el escenario físico donde se desarrolla el drama de
la vida. Algunos son símbolos de experiencias, centros cargados de una gran signicación. Como
tales, están unidos al núcleo de la existencia humana.
3.
Dardel wrote in French. His boo was translated into Portuguese in 2011 by Professor Werther
Holzer from the Universidade Federal Fluminense, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. For this paper, all
passages that were quote were taen from the Portuguese version and converted to English.
*
O autor é doutor em Geograa pela Universidade Estadual Paulista Júlio de Mesquita Filho, Rio
Claro/SP. Líder do Núcleo de Estudos Transdisciplinares em Ensino, Ciência, Cultura e Ambiente (NuTECCA). Editor da revista Hipótese e coeditor da Revista Brasileira de Iniciação Cientíca.
References cited
DARDEL, E. 2011. L’homme et la terre: nature de la réalité géographique. Brazilian version by Werther Holzer. Perspectiva, São Paulo, Brasil.
FORTUNATO, I. 2012. “Mooca, ou como a verticalização devora a paisagem e a memória de um
bairro”. Arquitextos, 12(140.05).
FORTUNATO, I. 2014. Pateo do Collegio: um lugar na cidade de São Paulo. Instituto de Geociências e
Ciências Exatas, Rio Claro (SP), São Paulo, Brasil. Tese de Doutorado em Geograa.
FORTUNATO, I. 2015. Passeio como ação política de proteção ao lugar: as caminhadas noturnas no
centro histórico de São Paulo. (Paper submitted).
FORTUNATO, I.; BASTIDAS, J.; BARBOSA, J. E. C. e S. T. LIMA-GUIMARÃES. 2011. “Multifuncionalidade e consumismo na paisagem do Centro de São Paulo”. Caderno de Geograa, (21): 31-55.
GODkIN, M. A. 1985. “Identidad y lugar”. En: M. D. G. RAMÓN. Teoría y método en la geografía humana anglosajona. pp. 242-253. Editorial Ariel. Barcelona, España.
RELPH, E. 1976a. The phenomenological foundations of Geography. Discussion Paper no 21. Department of Geography, University of Toronto, Canadá.
RELPH, E. 1976b. Place and Placelessness. Pion Limited. London, Uk.
TUAN, Y. 1975. “Place: an experimental perspective”. The geographical review, LXV(2): 151-165.
TUAN, Y. 1976. “Humanistic Geography”. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 66(2):
266–276.
TUAN, Y. 1983. Space and place: the perspective of experience. Brazilian version by Lívia de Oliveira.
Difusão Européia do Livro. São Paulo, Brasil.
Lugar y fecha de culminación:
Itapetininga (São Paulo), Brasil,
julio, 2015
INICIO
SUMARIO
136
re was born and raised, for example, one’s paternal grandfather, allowing
the individual to better understand his or her own history and therefore
their very own self. Hence the author’s claim about the tas of a humanistic geographer being the research on emotion, symbols, and experience in
the sense of place. How do people experience delight of body and spirit within places? How do those feelings deeply connect us with a given place?
These were questions that prompted the development of what Tuan
(1976: 272) named as “distinctive humanistic approach”, which is precisely
to describe the quality of the emotion experienced in specic cases” or, better, in specic places. This author deals with the interpretation of complex
human experiences in their contradictions, ambiguities and inconsistencies. Experiences that lie, mainly, on what is symbolic about the places
of human life. The tas of the humanist geographer, explains Tuan (1976:
273), is to show “how the place is a concept and a shared feeling”, and its
contribution is to suggest ways in which a sense of place can be emphasized”.
From this point of view we can therefore strengthen the idea that the
relationship with places is very similar to the relationship with another
person, because nowing a place suggests nowing its history and its
specic features which give its identity. This becomes evident when Tuan
(1975: 152) states that “to know a place fully means both to understand it in
an abstract way and to know it as one person knows another”, ratifying the
idea that places are as important as people in the sense of our own existence.
Place ... meaning center... basis of the experience ... The sense of place
is built on the direct and/or symbolic experience, involving feelings of
well-being, joy, fear, disgust... meaning that it lies also on the updating
of the past by memory, whether individual or collective. Small places and
reserved, as the bedroom... huge places and unnown to the fullest, as
the country in which we live ... ephemeral and transient places ... Places ...
Place ... core of human existence.”
This is certainly inconclusive but, at our very best, we can properly
state that a place is not just there for it can be found there… And just lie
I have claimed ‘Mooca’ and ‘Pateo do Collegio’ as my places, I am quite
certain that everyone can meet their very own meaningful places.
Iván Fortunato
137
Notas sobre el lugar desde el punto de vista de la geograficidad. pp. 130—137
Notes
1.
I acnowledge Guilherme Fortunato for reviewing and offering quality comments on the draft
paper.
2.
The original text is in Spanish: En el pequeño mundo de cada persona los lugares son algo más
que unas simples entidades que proporcionan el escenario físico donde se desarrolla el drama de
la vida. Algunos son símbolos de experiencias, centros cargados de una gran signicación. Como
tales, están unidos al núcleo de la existencia humana.
3.
Dardel wrote in French. His boo was translated into Portuguese in 2011 by Professor Werther
Holzer from the Universidade Federal Fluminense, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. For this paper, all
passages that were quote were taen from the Portuguese version and converted to English.
*
O autor é doutor em Geograa pela Universidade Estadual Paulista Júlio de Mesquita Filho, Rio
Claro/SP. Líder do Núcleo de Estudos Transdisciplinares em Ensino, Ciência, Cultura e Ambiente (NuTECCA). Editor da revista Hipótese e coeditor da Revista Brasileira de Iniciação Cientíca.
References cited
DARDEL, E. 2011. L’homme et la terre: nature de la réalité géographique. Brazilian version by Werther Holzer. Perspectiva, São Paulo, Brasil.
FORTUNATO, I. 2012. “Mooca, ou como a verticalização devora a paisagem e a memória de um
bairro”. Arquitextos, 12(140.05).
FORTUNATO, I. 2014. Pateo do Collegio: um lugar na cidade de São Paulo. Instituto de Geociências e
Ciências Exatas, Rio Claro (SP), São Paulo, Brasil. Tese de Doutorado em Geograa.
FORTUNATO, I. 2015. Passeio como ação política de proteção ao lugar: as caminhadas noturnas no
centro histórico de São Paulo. (Paper submitted).
FORTUNATO, I.; BASTIDAS, J.; BARBOSA, J. E. C. e S. T. LIMA-GUIMARÃES. 2011. “Multifuncionalidade e consumismo na paisagem do Centro de São Paulo”. Caderno de Geograa, (21): 31-55.
GODkIN, M. A. 1985. “Identidad y lugar”. En: M. D. G. RAMÓN. Teoría y método en la geografía humana anglosajona. pp. 242-253. Editorial Ariel. Barcelona, España.
RELPH, E. 1976a. The phenomenological foundations of Geography. Discussion Paper no 21. Department of Geography, University of Toronto, Canadá.
RELPH, E. 1976b. Place and Placelessness. Pion Limited. London, Uk.
TUAN, Y. 1975. “Place: an experimental perspective”. The geographical review, LXV(2): 151-165.
TUAN, Y. 1976. “Humanistic Geography”. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 66(2):
266–276.
TUAN, Y. 1983. Space and place: the perspective of experience. Brazilian version by Lívia de Oliveira.
Difusão Européia do Livro. São Paulo, Brasil.
Lugar y fecha de culminación:
Itapetininga (São Paulo), Brasil,
julio, 2015